Seminar 9-5-25: seminar by Prof. Laura Sanchez (UC Santa Cruz)

In nature, small molecules are often produced by macro- and microorganisms in order to facilitate communication and drive biological processes to the benefit (or detriment) of the community as a whole. Chemical gradients and chemical cues via the production of small molecules are ubiquitous across biological systems and my lab has previously applied imaging mass spectrometry (IMS) to study these cues and gradients in microbial systems. IMS can detect molecular signatures of interest in a sample as well as their spatial distributions across the entire sample. Taking advantage of known strengths of imaging on agar for bacteria, we have adapted IMS to be compatible with mammalian tissues and cells grown in a 3D agarose matrix, specifically focused on high grade serous ovarian cancer metastasis. We have used IMS to uncover the chemical exchange in cancer and have applied other mass spectrometry approaches to begin to explore single cell measurements using expansion approaches.